NEW ORLEANS - Just as Southern University of New Orleans was about to begin classes for 3,800 students, its largest enrollment at this campus, Hurricane Katrina swept in, flooding all of the college's buildings and sending the entire student body packing.
Then Hurricane Rita followed.
Standing in front of the wind-beaten, water-soaked, mold-infested administration building recently, Robert B. Cannon, Southern's assistant vice chancellor for administration, said he doesn't know where to begin cleaning up.
The floors that used to gleam are covered in a thick, black slime. Desks and computers are scattered around. Trees that once shaded students lounging on the yard have been knocked down. Most of the grass and greenery are dead.
All of the classroom resources - paperwork, books, research materials - have bathed in water for weeks.
"The smell is unbelievable," he said. "It was a beautiful campus. Now it's a mess. It's going to be a massive undertaking to get this campus up and running again."
For years, New Orleans has been a hub of historically black colleges devoted to producing black doctors, scientists, teachers, and social workers. Southern, Dillard University, and Xavier University are within 10 miles of each other.
But now, all three campuses have been devastated. Unlike their counterparts Loyola and Tulane universities, which have large endowments, Xavier, Dillard, and Southern rely heavily on student-paid tuition to function. With no students, the schools' futures are in jeopardy.
Just as city and state leaders have begun pleading for federal aid and tax incentives to help bring the city back to life, leaders of these colleges have started their own drives to get funding to revive their schools.
Their survival is critical: All three specialize in producing hundreds of black professionals.
The federal government and the state must value the legacy and history of the historically black colleges and universities, "which have 75 percent more success in graduating its students than mainstream universities," said Marvalene Hughes, president of Dillard. The colleges "have played a significant role in diversifying the workplace all over the world," she said.
Indeed, Dillard has graduated some of the highest-ranking teachers in Louisiana and is highly recognized for its nursing program.
Xavier University produces more black doctors than any other undergraduate college and has educated one-fourth of the country's black pharmacists.
Southern, which also has campuses in Baton Rouge and Shreveport, was known in New Orleans for its premier school of social work.
They are hoping to get enough government aid, private donations, and alumni support to reopen next semester and continue offering higher education tailored for minorities. Already the schools have started securing grants, reaching out to private corporations, and leaning on alumni to help them reopen.
Late last month, Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. (D-Ill.) and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) held a fundraiser in the District of Columbia to help.
Even as the schools begin to clean up the campuses and find more stable financial footing, they face other hurdles that could hinder them from reopening as soon as they'd like.
Where will faculty live? How will they house all of their students in New Orleans, a city with many damaged homes? How will they recruit with such dramatic destruction evident?
"There are a lot of questions," said Elizabeth Barron, Xavier's vice president for academic affairs. "But our reputation is worth saving. We didn't earn the reputation for beating the odds without deserving it. Students will still want their degree to be from Xavier. They'll come back because of it."
When Hughes took over the top position at Dillard in July, she vowed to preserve the school's legacy of nurturing blacks and helping them start careers. Particularly now, she said, she must remain loyal to that mission.
"My charge is to lead a wounded community through this devastation," she said, "and to empower it to rebuild and reclaim an identity that is so meaningful and old we cannot give it up."
(c) 2005, Chicago Tribune. Distributed by KRT.
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